Sugar Land couple sues Boy Scouts for $50M over son's death on camping trip

By Carol Christian |
April 15, 2014
| Updated: April 15, 2014 5:36pm

A Sugar Land couple whose 10-year-old son died after getting hit by a golf cart on a camping trip are suing the Boy Scouts of America for $50 milion.

Mark and Melissa Evans filed the suit Jan. 14, 2013, in Harris County's 129th State District Court, against the Boy Scouts of America, the organization's Sam Houston Area Council and Sugar Land Baptist Troop 1845 -- referred to collectively as the Boy Scout defendants.

The suit also named the golf cart driver at a state park and the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife as defendants. Parks and Wildlife was later dropped from the suit.

In their fifth amended petition filed Jan. 10, 2014, Mark and Melissa Evans claim that their son's death was primarily caused by "organizational, systemic and individual failures" of the Boy Scout defendants.

According to the petition, the Sam Houston Area Council's guide to camping sites identified Stephen F. Austin State Park, about 50 miles west of Houston in Austin County, as a spot where scouts "could and should" go camping but provided no evaluation of possible risks.

At the time of the October 2012 camping trip attended by James Evans and his father, Troop 1845 had untrained and unqualified leadership, the petition states.

"Chairpersons of various committees lacked even the most basic, required training," the petition states. "Other adult leaders had no idea how to plan a camping trip."

In their answers to the petition, the Boy Scout defendants denied the allegations and said that if, in the unlikely event a jury found there was a lack of supervision, the defendants would show the lack was on Mark Evans' part -- that he failed to keep a proper lookout and failed to supervise his son.

The petition describes the Boy Scouts of America as especially interested in money, the driving force behind a recruitment effort that started in about 2010. That year, the national organization's total assets exceeded $1 billion, and the chief executive officer received compensation of more than $1 million, the petition states.

Recognizing it was losing money through operating camping property it owned, the Sam Houston Area Council wanted to "shrink its property portfolio" and began looking at other property as potential camping destinations, according to the petition.

For its monthly campout in October 2012, the Sam Houston Area Council decided to use Stephen F. Austin State Park and invited boys and parents from Webelo groups (fourth and fifth grade Cub Scouts) for purposes of recruiting new Scouts, the petition states.

On the weekend in question, the campers ended up in two camp sites, one on either side of a road through the park.

On Oct. 13, Mark Evans and other parents of Cub Scouts were asked to assemble near a fire pit and were "recruited" by Troop 1845 adults. Meanwhile, James and other children were left unsupervised at the campsite across the road, the petition states.

"James and his best friend were left alone, and eventually decided to rejoin the rest of the group," the petition states.

Vehicles and trailers parked at the campsite obscured Mark Evans' view of his son and allegedly that of the golf cart driver who hit the boy, according to the lawsuit.

The driver was a "park host" who used the cart to look for unoccupied campsites, the petition states.

Mark and Melissa Evans are represented by Houston attorney Stephen M. Fernelius. The suit is scheduled for trial in November, according to online court records.